Opinions

 

 

Tales from a Dive

Ghosts of the Old Bar

Brady Ehler, OP Opinions Editor

V \ hen I’m not doing

schoolwork, or writing for the Other
Press, | work as a bartender at a seedy
bar downtown. As I hope to illustrate
to you all, through my new column,
“Tales from a Dive,” working at a seedy
bar can be quite entertaining. Mix men
and women of all ages (provided they
are of legal drinking age) with drugs,
alcohol, and loud music, as you shall
soon see, entertaining tales have a habit
of manifesting themselves.

However, this story deals with none
of those things listed above; neither
drugs, nor alcohol, nor rock and roll.
Indeed, not even a man or woman at
least not a living one.

The bar has a lot of history; the
building has been around for more
than a hundred years. In fact, during
the days of prohibition, there used to
be an underground drinking hole in the
current basement. There is a piece of
sheet metal at the bottom of the stairs
that covers up an old tunnel that was
used to smuggle booze in from the
harbour. There are also the remnants of
what used to be a dog-fighting pit in the
middle of the room.

I heard rumours that the underground
bar at one point was run by The Hell’s
Angels Motorcycle Club, and that
a fellow was murdered down there.
There is a particular room hidden
away in a dark corner that, to the best
of my knowledge, serves no practical
purpose. It is a small square room with
a concrete floor, which is partitioned by

Pg 6

 

a heavy, half-foot-thick latched door,
which can only be opened from the
outside. Well, during the Hells Angels
occupation of the bar, a fellow was
allegedly brutally beaten, then thrown
into the aforementioned room...or so
the story goes.

Amongst the staff, the room has
charmingly been dubbed, “The Murder
Room.” The door to The Murder Room
has a strange characteristic: whenever
someone takes it upon themself to shut
the door (which as I mentioned before,
is very heavy, and indeed, very difficult
to close), it has a strange habit of
becoming open after a day or two.

Now, I’m as skeptical about ghosts
as anyone, but when weird things
happen on a consistent basis, I start to
accept the possibility. Isn’t that what
any prudent human being would do?
After all, isn’t it wiser to accept the
possibility of the paranormal, then
to blindly ignore it? At what point
does refusing to believe cease to be
reasonable and start to be cowardly?

One evening, I was bored in the
middle of a shift, and decided to
show some friends the basement.
Amongst my exhibits was one of the
old washrooms, wherein the light-bulb
had recently burned out. Upon trying to
enter the washroom, the door decided
to close of its own accord, which struck
me as strange, because there was no
avenue for a draft to come out of the
washroom. A little shaken, I decided
to move the tour ahead. After showing
my friends the old dog-fighting pit, I

   

decided to show them the murder room.
Once near the room, one of my friends
began hyperventilating, then screaming.
Needless to say, I ushered her quickly
away, and out from the basement.

More recently, I got a call from my
manager, who saw something alarming
on one of the security cameras; there
was an old fellow in 1940s dress,
hanging out down by the empty bottles.
Upon going downstairs to check it
out, he found no one, and not even a
trace that anyone had been down there
mucking about.

Before writing this piece, I called
my manger to ask him how the ghost in
the basement scenario turned out, and
though he found nothing, he mentioned
that one of the cooks had a run-in with
an otherworldly presence just the day
before.

At the end of any given shift, I
have to go down into that creepy
basement, and count inventory, and
I am always alone. Needless to say, I
get goosebumps every time I go down
there. Up until now, I had never actually
heard of someone seeing a ghost as
opposed to merely feeling a strange
presence, but I'll tell you one thing —
I’m sure not looking forward to the end
of my next shift. Truth is, I’m scared,
because that place is making me believe
in ghosts. I think I’ll be lucky if I see
one, after all wouldn’t that be proof of
life after death?

 

Smokable
Treats for
Kids are
Here!

Brady Ehler, OP Opinions Editor

a those cigarette-shaped
sugary treats you used to buy as a kid?
The long cylindrical white sugar-sticks
that came in a container that looked
suspiciously like a cigarette package? I
sure do. When I was a kid, I used to buy
them, eat them, and of course just stick
them in my mouth and pretend I was one
of those cool anti-hero types that I had
seen in the movies.

I haven’t seen them in a long time,
and I’m pretty glad for it; I’m pretty
sure that they may lead directly to kids
taking up smoking later in life. I sure
did, not to shrug off responsibility here.
I don’t blame my smoking cigarettes on
candy. But, I see it as a small part of the
problem.

I have had plenty of opportunities
to quit in the past. I have quit several
times. In fact, I quit about once a week
and I never buy whole packs. Instead,

I buy these little flavoured single
cigarillos called “Prime Times.”

The great thing about Prime Times,
is that they come in a huge selection
of flavours: strawberry, cherry, peach,
spearmint, chocolate mint, cinnamon,
raspberry, etc. And when you put your
tongue on the end of the filter, you can
taste sugar, just like those old cigarette-
shaped candy sticks we used to know
and love.

Now, theses flavoured cigarillos are
quite expensive ($2.00 each), but not
so expensive that a young guy or gal
couldn’t scrape up enough change to
hand off to his/her older sibling to buy
one for them. If you really like these
things, you can also buy them in packs
of 10 for $10, thus saving SO per-cent.

Hey, you know what else costs $10?
A pack of real cigarettes, that’s what.
They may not be infused with candy
flavouring, but you get 20 in a pack
instead of a measly 10. Wow, that’s like
saving 50 per-cent again!

If I didn’t know better, I would think
that big tobacco companies are trying
to come up with new, crafty ways of
recruiting young smokers. Fortunately,
I do know better. I also know that big
tobacco would never do anything to
harm anyone, especially kids. Besides,
cigarettes aren’t addictive anyway.